Monthly Archives: May 2013

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In addition to my post on Tom O’Loughlin, here is an absolutely brilliant and erudite piece by David Bentley Hart from First Things (June/July 2013). Hart outlines why disbelief or belief in gods and fairies (which he defines as things of this world/nature, i.e. created, if they exist) and disbelief in God.

Also, make sure you look through Father Aidan’s posts, particularly on the Church Fathers.

One of the strangest claims often made by purveyors and consumers of today’s popular atheism is that disbelief in God involves no particular positive philosophy of reality, much less any kind of religion or creed, but consists merely in neutral incredulity toward a certain kind of factual asseveration. This is not something the atheists of earlier ages would have been very likely to say, if only because they still lived in a culture whose every dimension (artistic, philosophical, ethical, social, cosmological) was shaped by a religious vision of the world. More to the point, it is an utterly nonsensical claim—so nonsensical, in fact, that it is doubtful that those who make it can truly be considered atheists in any coherent sense.

Admittedly, I suppose, it is possible to mistake the word “God” for the name of some discrete object that might or might not be found within the fold of…

Today I want to tell you about my original supervisor here at the University of Nottingham, Tom O’Loughlin. Tom is a bit of Renaissance Man in the field of theology. He has a BA in Philosophy and Medieval History from University College Dublin; a BD in Theology from St Patrick’s College; an MPhil and a PhD. Tom has done work in paleography, liturgy, ancient Irish and Welsh Christianity, Christian Origins, Patristics, Medieval Theology/Philosophy, and even works in New Testament areas from time to time.

I began working with Tom during my Master’s for which he graciously agreed to serve as second supervisor/examiner. I then came to Nottingham to work on grace in Columbanus with Tom. However, my interests shifted over the course of my first year and I moved from historical to systematic theology. Nevertheless, Tom was an excellent supervisor during the time he and I worked together.

Tom teaches several different classes here at Nottingham, particularly on subjects like the Eucharist and discipleship in the early Church. This upcoming academic year, Tom and Simon Oliver will be co-teaching a course on Medieval Christian Mysticism.

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 2013. ‘Reactions to the Didache in early twentieth-century Britain: a dispute over the relationship of history and doctrine?’. In: F. KNIGHT, ed., Festschrift for Prof. Keith Robbins (In Press.)

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 2012. ‘Jerome’s De uiris illustribus and Latin Perceptions of the New Testament’s Canon’. In: J.E. RUTHERFORD and D. WOODS, eds., The Mystery of Christ in the Fathers of the Church: Essays in Honour of D. Vincent Twomey SVD Four Courts Press, Dublin. 55-65

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 2010. ‘St Augustine’s view of the place of the Holy Spirit in the formation of the gospels’. In: D.V. TWOMEY and J. RUTHERFORD, eds., The Holy Spirit in the Fathers of the Church Four Courts Press. 86-95

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 2010. ‘Salvation and the liturgy: some examples from early Christian Ireland’. In: D.V. TWOMEY and D. KRAUSMÜLLER, eds., Salvation according to the Fathers of the Church Four Courts Press. 123-142

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 2008. The Biblical Text of the Book of Deer (C.U.L. Ii.6.32): Evidence for the Remains of a Division System from its Manuscript Ancestry. In: FORSYTH, K., ed., Studies on The Book of Deer Dublin: Four Courts Press.3-31

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 2002. Imagery of the New Jerusalem in the Periphyseon and Eriugena’s Irish Background. In:MCEVOY, J. and DUNNE, M., eds., History and Eschatology in John Scottus Eriugena and His Time Leuven: Leuven University Press. 245-259

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 2002. Muirchú’s theology of conversion in his Vita Patricii. In: ATHERTON, M., ed., Celts and Christians: New Approaches to the Religious Traditions of Britain and Ireland Cardiff: University of Wales Press. 124-45

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 2001. ‘Monasteries and manuscripts: the transmission of Latin learning in early medieval Ireland’.In: H. MORGAN, ed., Information, Media and Power through the Ages University College Dublin Press, Dublin. 46-64

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 1999. ‘Tradition and Exegesis in the Eighth Century: The Use of Patristic Sources in Early Medieval Scriptural Commentaries’. In: O’LOUGHLIN, T., ed., The Scriptures and Early Medieval Ireland: Proceedings of the 1993 Conference of the Society for Hiberno-Latin Studies on Early Irish Exegesis and Homilectics Brepols, Turnhout.217-239

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 1999. ‘An Early Thirteenth-Century Map in Dublin: A Window into the World of Giraldus Cambrensis’ Imago Mundi. 51, 24-39

O’LOUGHLIN, T., ed., 1999. The Scriptures and Early Medieval Ireland: Proceedings of the 1993 Conference of the Society for Hiberno-Latin Studies on Early Irish Exegesis and Homilectics Brepols, Turnhout.

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 1997. ‘Isidore’s Use of Gregory the Great in the Exegesis of Genesis’ Revue Bénédictine. 107, 263-269

O’LOUGHLIN, T., 1997. ‘Living in the Ocean: the significance of the patristic understanding of oceanus for writings from Iona’. In: C. BOURKE, ed., Studies in the Cult of Saint Columba Four Courts Press, Dublin. 11-23

Today I want to highlight Dr Alison Milbank. Alison and I share many affinities, particularly a love for combining (or showing the existing relationship between) literature and theology. Alison studied Theology and English Literature at Cambridge, doing her PhD at Lancaster. Alison’s work tends to focus in one sense on religion and culture and in another literature and theology. Her desire is to show how theology is and can be worked out through cultural poetic (that is artistic) processes.

Alison teaches a variety of classes from Religion and Fantasy to Dante. She also tends to teach the sections on Augustine of Hippo and Dionysius the Areopagite in a Master’s level course, From Plato-Hegel. While Alison is not one of my supervisors she has always had time for me to stop by and talk about the relationship between theology and literature, or paper ideas I have combining aspects of theology and literature. The paper I’m currently working on, ‘Avoiding Shortcuts: The Doctrine of Deification in Conversation with C. S. Lewis and the Church Fathers’, stems from multiple conversations we’ve had about deification in C. S. Lewis.

MILBANK, A., 2006. A Fine Grotesque or a Pathetic Fallacy? The Role of objects in the autobiographical writing of Ruskin and Proust. In: DICKINSON, R. and HANLEY, K., eds., Ruskin’s struggle for coherence: Self-representation through art, place and society Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Press. 90-105

MILBANK, A., OTTO, P. and MULVEY-ROBERTS, M., eds., 2004. Gothic Fiction: Rare Printed Works from the Sadleir-Black Collection of Gothic Fiction at the Alderman Library, University of Virginia: a listing and guide to the microfilm collection Marlborough: Adam Matthew.

MILBANK, A., 2003. “My precious” : Tolkien’s fetishized ring. In: BASSHAM, G. and BRONSON, E., eds., The Lord of the rings and philosophy: one book to rule them all Chicago: Open Court.

MILBANK, A., 1992. Daughters of the house: modes of the Gothic in Victorian fiction London: Macmillan.

Videos

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Theological Journey

Why Study J. R. R. Tolkien

Why Study Dante

Advent

Ash Wednesday

I hope you’ve enjoyed the videos and will pick up one of Alison’s books to read. If I can make a suggestion, I highly recommend her Chesterton and Tolkien as Theologians. It is indicative of her general interests and is an excellent book for fans of Chesterton and/or Tolkien.

Today I want to tell you a bit about my other supervisor, Dr Mary Cunningham. Mary is a lecturer in Church History here at the University of Nottingham, teaching classes on general church history, asceticism, Mary the Mother of God, and more. Her primary foci are Byzantine History (she is a member of the Eastern Orthodox Church) and Mary the Mother of God. (It should also be noted that Mary is not related to one of our other faculty members, Dr Conor Cunningham.)

Mary did her undergraduate studies at Harvard University in Comparative Religion, focusing primarily on Byzantine theology and Medieval Greek. She then went on to do her Master’s and PhD at the University of Birmingham in the UK.

Bibliography

MARY B. CUNNINGHAM, 2012. ‘The Place of the Jesus Prayer in the Philokalia’. In: BROCK BINGAMAN AND BRADLEY NASSIF, ed., The Philokalia: A Classic Text of Orthodox Spirituality Oxford University Press. 195-202

CUNNINGHAM, MARY B., 2011. ‘The use of the Protevangelion of James in eighth-century homilies on the Mother of God’. In: CUNNINGHAM, MARY B. AND BRUBAKER, LESLIE, ed., The Cult of the Mother of God in Byzantium: Texts and Images Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing. 163-78

CUNNINGHAM, MARY B. AND BRUBAKER, LESLIE, ed., 2011. The Cult of the Mother of God in Byzantium: Texts and Images Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing.

CUNNINGHAM, MARY B., 2004. ‘The letter and the spirit: some problems in transmitting patristic texts to a modern audience’. In: M. MULLETT, ed., Metaphrastes, or Gained in Translation Belfast: Queen’s University Press. 28-38

CUNNINGHAM, MARY B., 2004. ‘The meeting of the old and the new: the typology of Mary the Theotokos in Byzantine homilies and hymns’. In: R.N. SWANSON, ed., Studies in Church History: The Church and Mary 39.Woodbridge, Suffolk: Boydell Press. 52-62

I hope you’ve enjoyed Mary’s videos and will check out some of her published work. Mary is an excellent scholar who seeks to do historical theology, that is, she seeks to study and understand the history of Christianity in its past and contemporary theological contexts and implications. It is an honour to have her as one of my supervisors.

I’ve been at the University of Nottingham for nearly two years now and have gotten to know many members of our faculty fairly well. That being the case, I thought I would take some time to do posts on some of our faculty. These first posts I intend to do will be on faculty I think to be stellar, but relatively unknown (or at least not widely known).

The first member of our faculty I wish to highlight is Dr Simon Oliver, Head of Department for Theology and Religious Studies here at Nottingham. Simon works in systematic and philosophic theology. Simon is also a priest in the Anglican Church, serving as honorary Canon Theologian at the minster in Southwell and is an associate priest at a local parish. Simon also happens to be one of my supervisors. He is currently working on a book dealing with creation and teleology that meshes well with my own project on deification. You can read more about Simon’s interests here.

Today, for Western Christians, is Trinity Sunday. Today we set aside some time to contemplate a God that is both 1 and 3. This is terribly difficult understand. Since God is completely other than us, we can never come to full knowledge of him in his essence. Nevertheless, God has revealed himself to us and he has done so in three persons who are one.

There are many heresies surrounding the notion of the Trinity. There are some who want to deny Christ’s divinity (and implicitly the Spirit’s as well); there are some who accept the Son’s divinity, but deny the Spirit’s; there are some who deny that there are three persons at all, but only one who shows himself to us in three different ways. As many heresies as there are surrounding the Trinity, there are as many if not more analogies that attempt to explain it. While I think it good to try to understand God as Trinity, today, the key is worship the great mystery that is our God.

That being said, below you will find two videos on the Trinity. In the first, Dr Karen Kilby talks about a particular, modern analogy of the Trinity and her hesitancy about it. In the second, you will why using any analogy breaks down in the end.

May you find yourself in awe of the Trinity today, and away from incredibly difficult Irish snake farmers.

Ordinary Time is now upon us. It is time to remember that God is not only present in the feasts and solemnities, but in the everyday as well. I may try and do a post later this week on the importance of Ordinary Time, and I’ll definitely do a post for Trinity Sunday. Today, however, I simply wanted to post something fun.

Over the Easter Holiday, the Theology Department here at the University of Nottingham held it’s annual nearly week long event for its Distance MA students in Systematic/Philosophic Theology and Historical Theology. During the course of the week the picture below was snapped. Enjoy.